


Falling Petals

by digitalScribbler



Series: Growing a Garden [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Alternative Universe - Soulmates, Blood, Flowers, Injury, M/M, Near Death, Soulmate AU, Superpowers, mac and victor are terrible soulmates, mac drags victor back from the brink of death yet again, mac shows affection through sarcasm and cold looks, metahuman, nonbinary characters - Freeform, this is starting to look like a pattern, victor doesn't deserve any of this, victor really loves flowers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:20:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28111557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/digitalScribbler/pseuds/digitalScribbler
Summary: Victor used to be covered in flowers... In those early days he almost always had flowers running through his hair, plucked from somewhere else and tucked messily into the tangle of curls.Or, Victor meets a stranger in a garden.Inspired by the prompt, "Flowers bloom on your body where you soulmate gets cut/wounded."
Relationships: Victor Price/Mac Warren
Series: Growing a Garden [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2172408
Kudos: 3
Collections: Price Brothers, Victor Comes Home AU





	Falling Petals

Victor used to be covered in flowers. They sprouted so often that he almost expected them - begonia dripping down his cheek, a flash of tansy in the corner of his lip, petunias blooming across his knuckles like a beautiful bruise. In those early days he almost always had flowers running through his hair, plucked from somewhere else and tucked messily into the tangle of curls.

On particularly bad days, days so full of flowers Victor could barely bring himself to leave the house, his mother would give that quiet smile of hers. She claimed it was because their soulmate knew how much Victor loved flowers that so many grew.

“It’s like they’re giving you a garden,” she would say, sweeping petals off the floor, “so that you’ll be thinking of them.”

Looking back, she was definitely trying to keep him from worrying about his soulmate bleeding so much, but at the time the thought was comforting. Still, sometimes, when they had their own scabbed cheeks or split lip or bloody knuckles that were going to scar, they wondered if their soulmate appreciated the flowers, too. 

Victor hadn’t seen many flowers for a while, though. That was probably a good thing, in all honesty. It’s better to have an intact soulmate than an armful of flowers. But he almost missed the little reminders that there was someone else there - the bright greeting from a tiny papercut, the tickle of leaves around his ear, or the dried petals scattered under the couch like dust.

\---

Soulmates were the last thing on Victor’s mind when he was being thrown to the ground in a parking lot, sharp gravel biting his palms. He tried to pull himself up, ragged hand and bloody knuckles already curling into a fist, but there was a yell and a sound of shattering glass and then almost nothing at all.

And then the vibrant red pouring from what seemed like everywhere left a stain on the asphalt instead of petals and Victor gasped for air and it was his own blood dripping down his cheek this time.

He doesn’t remember how he got home or how he managed to drag himself up the stairs onto that old couch where Damien found him. His memory of it was torn to shreds with the rest of him, bits and pieces coming together and falling back apart again. 

Damien’s frantic face, sun filtering in between the blinds, overwhelming pain, the feeling of cold, the sound of strange voices, a dusty cramped room full of unfamiliar people, and sinking into a deep, syrupy blackness for what felt like a long, long time. 

\---

When they open their eyes, they’re looking at a stranger framed in flowers. 

He’s a garden come to life, the colors almost blinding against the dingy cast of the room. Sunflowers and marigolds cascade down his shoulders, forget-me-nots dance across his jawline, snapdragons and amaranth flash from between quick-moving hands. His shadowed face is harsh in comparison as his fingers trace out a twisting pattern on Victor’s arm with practiced efficiency, a few stray petals brushing against their skin as he moves. 

Victor inhales to try and say something, but a shot of pain runs through their chest instead and they give a hacking cough. The stranger pauses for a split-second without looking up, a curl of impatiens beginning to creep across his dark hair.

“Don’t move,” he says sharply.

Victor immediately opens their mouth to try again and is wracked with another bout of coughs and pain. This time the man’s eyes snap to meet theirs, diligent focus tinged at the edges with exasperation as a few more flowers start to bloom. His hands draw a few more shapes and suddenly Victor feels the pain start to melt away. They take a shaky, but complete, breath, and for just a moment the man’s expression softens ever so slightly.

“I didn’t spend hours on this for you to kill yourself with stupidity,” he says, coldly turning back to Victor’s arm. A few petals fall when he moves, adding to a surprisingly large pile that has collected on the floor. 

Victor considers trying to say something smart back, but suddenly even the thought of talking takes too much energy. He lays back, his eyes losing focus and his consciousness starting to drift. They struggle against it as much as they can, keeping their gaze on the bright yellows and pinks and blues, but it’s hard not to slip away with the perfume of summer hanging heavy in the air.

And when their eyes finally slide shut the blackness is a little less dark this time, laced with a whisper of snapdragons and sunflowers.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!!
> 
> This is one of two pieces (so far) pepperdot and I have written for Mac and Victor within this Soulmate AU, and I had a lot of fun with it!
> 
> Check out pepperdot's work, and if you like Mac, Victor, and Co. then check our our collection Price Brothers for more about all of them!


End file.
